Five Women
by Tahti
Summary: It took five women to get you off my mind. You think it worked?


_**Disclairmer: **__I'm not responsible for the characters below._

_**Warning: **__Mild references to sexuality ahead. An odd swear word._

_**A/N:**__ As much as I roll my eyes at 'songfics', this is kind of it. The title and concept are shamelessly stolen from Joe Cocker and his song "Five Women". Recently redone by Prince (which is the version that inspired me). I heard it today and immediately thought about Jack's recent misery…_

_This is completely AU__, and an exercise in some different writing style. Please tell me what you think._

_Basic summary? For whatever reason, Kate left Jack, and he seeks consolation in the arms of five different women (all of which we know – I took the characters and bent them to the idea)._

_Say YAY! with me! I managed to keep it short!_

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Her name was odd.

More like something taken from an index of exotic butterflies. I don't remember exactly.

Frail, and shimmery, and lively - she was an exotic butterfly.

I never cared for her name. It was foreign, that's all. She was foreign. She smiled at me, a sly, inviting smile. Flirting.

I bought her a drink and took her home that night.

So trivial.

Oh, she was willing just the same. Knew exactly what she wanted from me. And I knew what I was after. My mind hazy from the liquor, but never enough to blot out the memory of you. Shining through, clear as daylight, as I tore her skimpy top off.

It infuriated me, for all I wanted was to forget. To find solace in this audacious slant-eyed girl.

To erase you.

I wanted to screw her hard and fast, wanted her to scream my name in ecstasy, wanted to feel her nails scratch my back; I needed a victory over her.

Against a wall, I pushed her up against a wall.

All I remember is how light she was and how empty I felt when it was over.

Achara. Her name was Achara.

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Gabriela was beautiful.

The soft curve of her lips, her dark curls, her clean complexion so much like yours. But her meek eyes lacked the challenging sparkle that haunts me day and night.

I recognized the look she gave me when we first met. Longing and desire, born from all the wrong reasons.

It sickened me to comply, for all the wrong reasons, but I did.

I allowed her to kiss me, and without a word, let her lead me to the hotel. We didn't speak while undressing each other and my hands roamed her ripe body. She was supple and yielding. Sensual. She wanted to savour this, and I knew deep down it was me she wanted, not sex, but I didn't stop her when she kept slowing me down, kept seeking my gaze.

I closed my eyes, her body enveloping mine, and hoped that maybe, just maybe she could make me feel again.

The way she whispered my name was nothing like you did, but all I could think of was the sound of your voice when you welcomed me in.

She breathed something in her own language and all I heard was you telling me not to stop and how you loved me.

Each of the five nights she stayed, I came back to that impersonal room, to her jasmine-scented embrace, and each night I took her in silence, numbing the dull ache for you.

On the last one, she slept facing away from me. The mass of her hair, the curve of her waist under my arm, the dim light.

_Kate._

There was nothing else to say. She was crying when I left.

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Juliet wanted to help me.

I could tell she was watching, clear blue eyes following me, bright mind analyzing my reasons. Before, I hadn't really noticed her. But when she kept showing up in my office more and more often, kept finding work topics to discuss, kept insisting on keeping me company after hours, I really looked at her.

Different than you. Completely different. Blonde and tall and composed, always. And proud, like you.

She knew about us, she guessed about me, what I was doing.

Even though she never talked about it.

I succumbed.

It felt good to be respected, it felt good to walk with her, not speaking. Almost as comfortably as with you.

When she took my hand in her pale one, I didn't move back.

I didn't, when she kissed me.

_Let me_, was all she said, and I did. Took her to my flat and kissed her back until her eyelids became heavy and her rigid posture went lax in my arms, and then her graceful fingers mapped out their own tracks on my skin, so different to the ones you traced. Focused and attentive, she sought to give the act to me, give me something, I hadn't initially recognized.

She was offering all of herself to me.

Something I couldn't accept, as much I wished it wasn't so.

I gave her that night instead, held her and caressed her, soothed her when she sobbed into my shoulder, knowing that for one moment of blind rapture she had me, but I couldn't love her, not like I loved you. That she could never fix me.

I cursed you then. For breaking me, for breaking her.

When I woke up, she was gone, and she never talked about it.

I don't see her much anymore. Tequila is keeping me company these days.

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Sarah thought she could change me.

Vaguely resembling Juliet, with her fair colouring and aloofness, and vaguely resembling you, with her mood swings and unintentional cruelty.

I grew attached to her through her recovery, it was my responsibility. She looked at me with those wide, grateful eyes, with every step she took, and I cherished them along with her. That beaming smile when her own legs supported her again after I had taken the hope away.

Those were the only days when your image didn't tint my world with every heartbeat.

But then I would come back to the bed we once shared, and I felt like suffocating, the void palpable and real. I couldn't sleep there.

Her presence was hope. Hope for a miracle.

I got used to spending hours in the hospital, mostly by her side. Chatting, laughing, flirting. Something I didn't even know how to do properly.

Her eyes lit up at my sight, like yours once did; I reveled in it.

I thought she might be it, she might be my cure to the drug you are.

There was a reason to celebrate, when she got released. No one was surprised, or dismissive, when she invited me over for diner.

The diner turned into a date, the date turned into a series and the series ended in bed.

So much for ethics.

Her nervousness I found sweet and somewhat intimidating, thinking of all the expectations she might have had. If I was enough to fulfill them. The first time with someone you envision more times with tends to be so awkward.

But it wasn't for us, was it? It felt right between us. Right, and fitting, and natural.

She left me.

Weeks, or months, or years – what does it matter?

There was always something missing, there was always an unnamed buffer between us, a place she couldn't reach. A place that I deceived myself I could deny acknowledging of.

A dark, empty hole within me, where what you took away used to live.

She got angry, then distant. The sex became mechanical. A release for me, a release for her.

Again, your brow, knitted and then smoothing over when you gazed back at me in amazement each and every time, in the communion we shared, began shining through when she would drift to disappointed sleep.

I let her assume it was about work. Never told her about you.

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Ana-Lucia was a dare.

The way she kissed me was almost scary, anger and aggression crashing against my resignation.

Yes, it was that quick. There I went again, drowning my sorrows, done feigning prudery, done looking for anything more than a mindless fuck.

But she was you, all over again, restless and frantic and unhinged, like on the day you first kissed me. Her unruly brown hair pulled into a loose pony tail, her lips soft, but demanding, her small yet strong fingers impatient on me.

I could have closed my eyes and drift into the lie.

I didn't even get to buy her a drink.

She pulled me into the bar's loo. Wild and sweaty and intense, she was so much like you when she rode me furiously and sunk her teeth into my flesh. She scratched and gnawed and writhed and grunted, and I was all too familiar with that desperate chase for blank in her mind.

In me, she found a substitute for something, someone.

At least, we had that much in common.

It was usually the same. I met her in bars, I drank with her, I screwed her in some place dim and secluded enough. A back alley, a restroom, my car. Never took her home, she didn't ask me over either. Neat arrangement.

She didn't ask questions, didn't give opinions. Once, she told me it was okay to say a name, if I needed to.

Your name.

I didn't, but had it looped in my head when holding her tight by the slender hips, watching the dark curls spill over her shoulders. When thinking of her stubborn relentlessness and her denial to face whatever she was running from.

Yes, in many ways, she was like you.

It only made me miss you more.

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I saw you the other day.

Rain was pounding my windscreen and blurring the bright flickering lights with contours of buildings and cars. You stopped for traffic lights, next to me.

I don't know if my heart leapt or whatever they say, I don't know if I sensed your presence there. But I stared, hoping to etch the image into my retinas, hoping for a stop in time.

You looked beautiful. Lost in thought, your chin tilted up and your gaze unseeing, as if you were watching a vivid scene invisible for others. In your mind.

I remembered then, remembered everything I've been trying to forget and hoping never to forget. The warmth of your skin, the smile in your eyes, the smell of your fresh desire for me.

Echo of the way you made me feel pulsated through my bloodstream and the reality set in.

I fell in love with you all over again.

You never looked at me, not once.

The green light twinkled and you drove away toward the north exit, the one which led out of town.

Somewhere, under the same sun, you're a living breathing body, not a shadow against my eyelids. Not a wish, not a dream, not a memory.

Are you happy there, Kate?

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_Good, b__ad, meh?_


End file.
